From Idea to Reality: Reliving Rebuilding Joey’s Park Tonight

A beloved community playground, dedicated more than a three decades before to honor a boy who tragically died young, was suddenly condemned by the town due to wear and tear.

But rather than allow Joey’s Park, a long-time play space for students at the Winn Brook Elementary School and gathering spot for neighbors in northeast Belmont, to be demolished or wait years for the town find the money to rebuild the site, a small group of parents organized private businesses and more than 2,000 volunteers, raise $450,000 and planned and constructed the new Joey’s Park.

Sponsored by the Belmont League of Women Voters and presented by Diane Miller and Ellen Schreiber, co-chairs of the Friends of Joey’s Park effort to rebuild the Park, “Rebuilding Joey’s Park: A Community Success Story” will be held in the community room of the Wellington Elementary School located between School and Orchard streets tonight, Thursday, April 10 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

This is an event for those who want to relive the effort it took to reconstruct the play space and for anyone who wants a great primer on getting a community project, large or small, from idea to reality.

Things to Do Today: Kennels, LEGO Club and Tax Help

Things to do around Belmont today, Thursday, April 10.

• The Belmont Board of Health will be holding an informational public meeting on the proposed bylaw amendments on animal kennels in town. In addition, the board will vote on whether to allow one final season (its 102nd!) of swimming at the Underwood Pool. The meeting takes place at 5:30 p.m. in the Town Hall auditorium.

• It’s LEGO time at the Belmont Public Library! The library’s LEGO club is for kids in kindergarten through second grade who want to meet and create their own unique structures.  All LEGOs will be provided so just bring your imagination to the Assembly Room from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Belmont High School Boys’ Tennis will be taking on Reading at the High School’s courts at 3:30 p.m.

• The Belmont Senior Center at the Beech Street Center, 266 Beech St., will be offering tax assistance to seniors today and tomorrow from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Call 617-993-2970 for availability.

• On this day in 1925, “The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald is first published in New York City.